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NICK DOUGLAS — When a tech company actually builds something, you'll hear about it first at a news source like CNet or TechCrunch. But while it's still a glint in a startupper's eye and anything can happen, we're ready for the pre-op interview. Our two strategies: Be cruel, and drink beforehand (in this instance, a double screwdriver). Our first subject, 16-year-old college student Jessica Mah, already built and sold a company. Now she's working on what she calls the eBay of hired services. In the following interview, she tells me why she plans to make a billion dollars before she's 25.


Nick Douglas: 1. Tell me your company in three sentences. Take your time.

Jessica Mah: Our company sets out to be the eBay of services. Whether you're looking to hire an interior decorator or DJ or website designer, we'll provide a reliable and safe marketplace for buyers and sellers.

Nick: You've mentioned that journalists want to write about your company. what's the bit they always want to talk about?

Jessica: My age! It's not too frequent that you see a 16 year old girl networking with middle-aged men at business-related conferences and mixers.

Nick: You do work with older people though, yes? As well as some other young people?

Jessica: I work with mostly older people - the average age of my team members (excluding myself) is 32. Young people I play with.

Nick: I'm impressed that you already ran another company. Tell me about that.

Jessica: When I was 13, I worked on a hosting and dedicated server company. I was running C's in school, but I didn't think much of it because I was making more than my teachers were. I'd get support and sales calls in the middle of biology and have absolutely no problem walking out. And I did - many many times.

Nick: So you have experience running, well, a real business, so you're possibly more qualified to run a fake one. Which is what every dot-com is before it finally IPOs, right?

Jessica: Totally!

Nick: What's your exit plan?

Jessica: Ideally, I would be the CEO of a "fake" company that IPOs.

Nick: For how much money?

Jessica: I'd love to exit with a good $1B - hopefully by the time I turn 25. Of course, everybody tells me that it won't happen and that I'm being unrealistic. Screw that, I'm gonna run a business and make a billion dollars and nothing can stop me!

Nick: Picked a name?

Jessica: Not yet - that's actually been our hardest problem. [We thought of] Servio.com, Prodessa.com, and plenty of names that none of us seem to really like.

Nick: Why will you gain ground when Craigslist, Elance, and a billion other sites seem to handle services just fine?

Jessica: None of them have solved the initial problem. Our idea for the company actually sprung up after having used Craigslist and Elance for so long. I've mentioned on my blog, Jessicamah.com, many times that I see way too many websites and technologies that forget the problem they're trying to solve and concentrate way too much on monetizing.

Buyers need a means of finding a service provider - they want to be able to compare reputation and prices on the spot. Service entrepreneurs want a way to market their services, but craigslist and elance make it no easier to do so from our personal experience.

Nick: Why hasn't anyone started this company before?

Jessica: I've spoken to a lot of people who claimed to have thought of the same exact idea, but I truly doubt that they can execute the way my team plans to. Many businesses may be in the same market, but the problem is, they put their business model before anything else.

Nick: When will your site launch to the public?

Jessica: We're scheduled to launch a beta release this summer. Buyers will have free access, but service entrepreneurs will eventually have to pay in a similar way that sellers have to pay on eBay.

Nick: What happens if eBay, Elance, or Craigslist implements all your improvements this fall?

Jessica: It's doubtful that they will. All of them seem focussed to do what they've been doing in the past decade. There are plenty of startups that are trying to "copy" us, but my team welcomes any competition.

Nick: If the whole thing goes tits-up, what will you do next?

Jessica: We'll say we learned from the experience and move onto the next big idea. No biggy. But until our business goes tits-up, we're putting all of our energy into making this the next big thing.

Nick: Why is this the next big thing? Why is service exchange a billion-dollar business? After all, eBay and Craigslist may not be perfect, but why do you think you can break the inertia?

Jessica: Services account for 55% of the US economy, and its rising. eBay concentrates on tangible goods, and that market is shrinking.

Nick: Are you going to take funding, and whose money will it be?

Jessica: At the moment, my COO and I plan on funding the seed round ourselves with the money we've made on previous businesses.

Jessica: And once we need money, we'll call up our angel investor friends. Raising money is currently on the bottom of our worry list.

Photo courtesy of Jessica Mah.) Nick Douglas writes for Valleywag, Prezzish, and Look Shiny. Honestly, a billion dollars? Hey, if shooting for that means making $100 mil...